


all these starved ghosts watching

by Catherines_Collections



Category: Bandom, Fall Out Boy, The Youngblood Chronicles (Music Video)
Genre: Ambiguity, Blood and Gore, Blood and Torture, Body Horror, Gen, Gore, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, so much. just- so much.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-10
Updated: 2018-06-10
Packaged: 2019-05-20 09:18:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14891876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Catherines_Collections/pseuds/Catherines_Collections
Summary: There’s blood on his hands and it’s not a surprise.Pete has blood crusting on his back, in his hair, across his face. It’s only when he sees that it’s coating his fingers thick, flips them around until it’s all justred, he realizes that he’s choking on it, too.





	all these starved ghosts watching

**Author's Note:**

> I completely revamped my first draft & am very thankful for it. Also, shout out to 13 y/o me who discovered DP fanfic & fell in love with the body horror trope, but was never able to write it well until now.
> 
> Read the tags. Trust me. Heed them.
> 
> I own nothing but the title, enjoy!

 

Of all the stories Pete heard about the end, he never once thought it would be like this.

He imaged the world compressed down to blood and burning and ruin. Instead, it’s a puzzle made of pieces that don’t fit right. There are snapshots and blood clots and violence only for a few rather than the whole. Maybe that’s supposed to make it worse.

There’s a briefcase cuffed to his wrist that Pete wishes he could saw into, and a skyline that looks too normal for how different everything is now— desperate drenched and drained. He almost wants to cut it with his teeth, see if it would stain: a mark to represent the change everything’s taken on.

Pete moves his fingers, watches his knuckles flex. Does it again until they start to feel sharp and the bones start to ache.

He has Patrick’s hand in a bag buried in the back of the van. Andy gagged the first time he saw it, and Joe left the room quick as he entered. Patrick just stared until he started laughing, and no one asked anything else about the hook or yellow eyes they found him with.

Five of Patrick’s fingers are in their van; five fingers that can’t move on their own anymore. Patrick doesn't look at them, so Pete does, instead.

They each have snapshots of visions of captivity. Moments that don’t seem to fit right into each other, but they try to piece them together the best they can. Patrick’s are the fuzziest, but they’re also the most violent. Patrick’s the one who leaves the session first, mostly. Pete doesn’t blame him.

The van creaks behind him, and he knows Joe’s shifting. Patrick’s walking somewhere in the forest around them, nearby and too far simultaneously. Pete glances back when the van creaks again and sees Joe’s watching him. Pete watches back.

“It’s not going to get any better, is it?” Joe asks, quiet, face half hidden from the shadowing of the van. He sounds as tired as they all feel, and Pete doesn’t even have to look back to know his eyes are downcast, hair oily and overgrown.  
  
There’s a million things Pete could say to that.

He could say, _no. This is as good as it's ever going to get now._ Or _, I wish with every bone in my body that this wasn’t the end._ But they’re both too tired for false comforts and well wishes. He laughs, instead, and hopes Joe gets what he needs from it when he turns back around.

Andy’s curled up somewhere behind them and Pete breathes out when the silence falls back into place. He can hear Joe crawling back into the van for warmth, leaving Pete sitting on the edge of the truck.

It’s not Pete’s turn to patrol, but he told Patrick before he left that he’d take it anyway. Patrick just nodded, didn’t look back. Pete tries not to worry about what any of it means.

He tilts his head back and stares up at the star from the end of the van, bat in hand and briefcase tied to the other. A breeze blows by that shakes the trees. He closes his eyes and lets it move him.

For a moment, Pete swears, it almost sounds like laughter.

 

.

 

Patrick comes back and nothing goes back to normal, but his shoulders are looser than they were when he left.

Pete doesn’t ask where he’s been and Patrick doesn’t offer. He throws a few more can goods into the trunk, though, and they’re all grateful enough not to press.

Everything is an adjustment now, similar but different in too many ways that keep them all up at night. Yellow eyes get caught between every second glance, and Pete smiles with too many teeth. Andy says they’re going to go barbaric soon with this much seclusion, and Joe snorts into his water bottle.

Andy shrugs, says, “Isolation will make new people out of us, if you want to think of it that way.”

Patrick leans on the van, not close enough to touch but closer than he’s been lately, and rolls his eyes, “I really really don’t.”

Joe mutters his agreement as his head falls onto Andy’s shoulder.

Pete stands and stretches, aims a small smile at Patrick. Patrick doesn’t return it, turns his head down to where his shoe is digging into the dirt. Pete’s teeth catch the light.

Andy interrupts, says, “Your shift tonight, Pete. Sleep while you can.”

Joe rolls his eyes and Andy catches it, elbows him with a frown.

Pete just nods, takes a sip of the water bottle after Joe passes it.

 

.

 

The first thing he notices is all the red.

It’s in everything, _is_ everything. The tint filters in and drowns everything in it.

There’s table with what can only be described as a feast set on it. Women are surrounding it, dressed in black and red, and when Pete tries to reach for the table something sharp cuts into his wrists. He looks down and finds rope and wire on his wrist. No briefcase, only bruises and blood rings. He doesn’t pull at them, has learned better since that case first locked onto his wrist.

When he looks up again, Patrick’s sitting across from him, smirking. Patrick gestures to the table, and there’s so many different plates of meat that Pete stops counting, turns his attention back to Patrick- back to what Patrick now has.

Patrick has ten fingers and two wrists on one glance two. Another glance and he’s got five fingers on one hand and a hook on the other. The hook’s dripping with something black, and Pete wants to ask what’s happening but his lips won’t move right.

A woman steps behind him and then he can’t see, something soft placed over his eyes. He can only feels as something is placed on his lips. No one says anything when he struggles. Pete thinks he hears a laugh, but everything around him is so loud he can’t place it.

There’s more food, more wine, more things he can’t see being placed onto his tongue.

Someone grabs his chin, makes him bite into the thing pressed onto his lips. The juice runs down his lips and it tastes like blood. Everything smells like blood and meat; everything sounds like screeching laughter.

Pete screams around the hand shoving itself into his mouth.

 

.

 

It’s almost funny, in an ironic sort of way maybe, when he wakes up screaming.

It’s less funny when Andy’s yelling at Joe to hold his legs down because Pete’s thrashing, still unaware of his own body.

His arm hits something and the scent of copper fills the air at the same time the sharp stabs of pain sting down his arm like needle pricks. Joe’s shouts, _shit. Hold his arm down. Don’t let him see that, fuck,_ and then he’s pinned. The anxiety of being tied down brings him back.

When he comes through it’s to Andy saying his name and Joe sitting on his chest. None of it’s red. Pete blinks into consciousness.

When he tilts his head he sees Patrick in the doorway, all the color drained out of him, white like he’s his own ghost. Pete registers that Patrick’s still in the doorway while Joe and Andy help him sit up, slow, and decided that’s exactly what he is now.

Joe grabs a spare shirt to wrap around his arm. It doesn't stop the bleeding right away, but at least this way none of them have to look at the wreckage.

When Pete looks back to the corner Patrick’s gone. Andy shakes his head and grabs for the antiseptic.

Pete grabs for his bat and watches the sun fall outside the van windows.

 

.

 

They have a routine now, when any of them have nightmares.

All of them sit and listen as the person repeats it, the best they can recall, and one person - usually with the best handwriting, so mostly Joe - writes down every word. After, they compare notes, visions, memories. Anything that connects to yellow eyes, a briefcase, or the general theme of chaos that rules them now.

Sometimes they get connections that usually lead to nowhere. Others, weird and pitying looks. Stress dreams don’t combine very well with constant chaos and anxiety they’ve found.

It’s Pete who has them the most, though. He wants to make a joke about giving up his title of isolated insomnia but he doesn’t think anyone would laugh, so he keeps it to himself.

Patrick doesn’t have many nightmares, or if he does he doesn’t share.

Every time someone says they dreamt in _yellow_ Pete can see Patrick grinding his teeth. Pete wants to tell him to join the club.

This time, after Pete recounts and watches Patrick look everywhere but him, he tells them he’s going to scavenge and heads where Andy’s eyes and Joe’s pity can’t follow him.

 

.

 

The scene plays out like it’s on a carousel— everything spinning in and out of focus when he looks at it for too long.

It’s a dining room with the table for the feast, a morgue, a church, a gray room with only televisions. Millions of conversation, scenes and settings speeding past. He feels like he’s flying across each of them, not touching the moments but watching them in passing.

It doesn't matter where he stands, Patrick’s there for all of them. His lips are moving through each of them but Pete can’t hear anything.

They’re in a parking lot, a forest, the van. The scene stops like a record player and Pete can feel the needle scratch down his back. He doesn’t reach back, can feel himself bleeding in strips through his jacket.

Patrick’s eyes are yellow. It’s Pete’s turn to play red.

Patrick’s wrist keeps changing from a hook to a hand, black sludge dripping from both. Patrick tilts his head, waves his hand and hook. Pete watches the black fly off and Patrick’s words finally start filtering through in snippets and scraps.

Pete reads his lips as they move, five to ten to fifteen conversations behind, missing words failing to connect themselves. Patrick’s lips lift into a knowing smile, and then it’s Patrick’s voice from every direction, echoing, “Did you ever think about how we fit into this?”

He hums, winks, and then Patrick has two hands again. Pete blinks.

“Just think,” Patrick sighs, knitting his fingers together. He looks back up to Pete, waves his hand and pouts when it folds itself back into the hook. “I could have kept that.”

Patrick steps closer and Pete stumbles back a few steps out of reflex. When his feet steady his stomach drops out. He can feel the blood dripping off his back and sliding down his thighs.

Patrick’s smile is expectant, like he knew this would happen. Like he was waiting for it.

Pete wants to throw up. He can feel what they managed to eat this past week crawling up his throat. He wants to shake Patrick until he understands and turns back into gold instead of red.

Patrick hums, nods his head and sticks out his bottom lip in false understanding, mirth burning beneath all that false sympathy. He’s all teeth, says, “Tell me,”

Patrick’s eyes are burning when he takes a step closer and Pete doesn’t move this time. Keeps himself locked in place as Patrick presses his chest up to Pete’s, biting his lip when he tilts his head up. Patrick’s eyes are all yellow, swallowing the iris. They don’t look like his anymore.

“Have you caught up yet?” Patrick runs a finger down his neck, tracing the rings of thorns, the other hand brushing his back. Pete presses his lips together when it comes back red. “Do you know where you fit into this? One of us does.”

Patrick leans up and Pete lets his eyes fall closed when Patrick’s breath brushes his ear, can feel Patrick’s smile curve against his neck. He doesn’t shake, takes a breath and Patrick chuckles against his skin, “ _Tick tock,_ Pete. We both know how this ends.”

When Pete opens his eyes he’s back in the van, Andy sitting on the edge of the trunk. Pete doesn't look behind him where Joe and Patrick are sleeping.

Pete can still feel the blood pooling through his shirt, a warning he doesn't want to take. He breathes and doesn’t move until he feels the bleeding stop. He flips the bat in his hand, doesn’t meet the stare burning into the back of his head.

 

.

 

Two more sunsets and it’s Joe’s shift again. Pete hands him the bat with a salute and Joe’s lips lift into a ghost of a smile Pete tries not to miss so much when it fades.

He finds Patrick pacing one of the outer layers of the forest. There’s dirt and mud on his face, on his clothes, and Pete doesn’t have to look at his hands to know it’s caked on beneath his nails too. He taps the briefcase with the tips of his fingers and Patrick looks up at the sound.

He’s blue instead of yellow today and his face turns down into a scowl when Pete steps closer, leans against the tree closest to him and raises his eyebrows. Patrick bares his teeth.

“What?” he asks, annoyance and almost rage, and Pete hums as he turns his eyes up to the sky.

“We could try to fix it, you know,” Pete says, almost a whisper, competing with the leaves as the wind blows them. “Reverse whatever happened. We could try to find someone who doesn’t know, won’t ask questions.”

Pete lowers his eyes back to Patrick’s face, watching as his lips press into a frown. “We could fix you. You don’t have to stay like this.”

The wind picks up after the words the and forest blows apart around them, leaves falling everywhere. Patrick steps forward until he’s the central focus in all the destruction, and it’s a metaphor of movement Pete doesn’t want to address. He watches as Patrick moves until he’s leaned up against the tree opposite to him. A safe distance, somewhere.

Patrick doesn’t meet his eyes, tilts his head down until all Pete can see is the mud crusted into his scalp, blending into the blood from his injuries, lips turned into a wry smile as he murmurs, “We both know it doesn't work like that.”

Pete thinks there’s a world of difference between thinking and knowing, that trying fits somewhere in between.

Instead he says, “This isn’t how I thought we’d end up, you know.”

Patrick scoffs and Pete turns back to him, smiling. “I’m serious, I pictured a few strippers. Maybe a few kids and more exes. Less red. Not...”

“This,” Patrick finishes, shaking his head. “Yeah. Me either.”

They let the silence settle. Patrick breaks it.

“Don’t try to fix this, okay?” Patrick says, turning his head away when Pete looks at him. “It’s not going to work.”

“We can always try,” Pete offers, and Patrick laughs.

“No, just- this isn’t going to get better. So let’s not make it worse, okay? Just trust me on this.”

Something sour settles in his stomach and Pete’s _okay_ cracks as it leaves his mouth, but Patrick pretends not to notice it. The wind picks up again and he’s not sure if he should be grateful.

 

.

 

Andy says they have enough rations to last them at least a week and everyone’s grateful for a delayed run. They try not to leave the forest completely unless they’re in pairs.

That’s one thing the kidnappings tended to keep constant was seclusion. They don’t plan on letting that happen again. The forest isn’t even a guaranteed shelter- the van they stole sticks out like a sore thumb. Andy makes sure their fires go out before dark and don’t leave smoke trails.

There’s a river about a mile out, but it’s for drinking only. None of them are foolish enough to wish for rain.

They have canned beans with some berries and roots Pete found around the inner rim of the forest. No one talks around the fire. Pete feels the mud crack on his skin when he stretches.

It’s Patrick’s shift again, and he finishes first, heads back to the van. It’s almost funny how no one looks forward to the night anymore.

Pete drops what’s left of the dry firewood into its pile, and no one bats an eye when he throws himself onto the van floor and closes his eyes.

 

.

 

They’re back in the forest, Pete blinks and the tree’s trunks are black like they’re rotting. All the leaves are gone and there’s ash everywhere.

Patrick’s fingers are tracing Pete’s chest. He hasn’t been this close for too long, and Pete closes his eyes, shudders when Patrick runs his nails over his chest, leans up to whisper in his ear, “Figure it out yet?”

Pete sinks into it, tilts his head and Patrick smiles against his neck, scraping his teeth against it. He almost doesn’t notice when Patrick shoves a hand forward.

There’s a loud sound, something like tearing or snapping, but it sounds distant. Pete can’t hear anything over the roaring in his ears. He’s choking, suddenly, stumbling back until he’s flat on the ground, everything hurting in a blinding kind of way where he almost can’t feel it at all.

Pete opens his eyes to the sky, body feels numb like he’s not even in it, something cold running down his face. It’s sensation so he follows it, lifts his hand to his mouth.

There’s blood on his hand and it’s not a surprise. Pete  has blood crusting on his back, in his hair, across his face. It’s only when he sees that it’s coating his fingers, flips them around until it’s all just _red_ , he realizes he’s choking on it, too. Becomes aware of the clots stuck in his throat.

Patrick’s watching, above him, head tilted like he’s curious about what’s going to happen next. His eyes are yellow, swallowing the iris and pupil completely. There’s nothing human about any of it.

There’s something in his hand when Pete blinks, tries to refocus.

More clots, more blood until it’s all just red and cascading from his mouth like a waterfall, breaths slowing to nearly nothing. Patrick leans down closer, dips one finger into the blood, giving Pete a better view of what he’s holding.

Pete blinks, dizzy, sees it’s a heart. A human heart.

The clots block his airways and he chokes, watches Patrick straighten- Pete’s heart in his hand.

He watches Patrick squeeze it, careful and careless in the same breath.

“I told you, Pete,” Patrick murmurs, voice like nails on a chalkboard for the first time Pete’s ever heard it. Every word lilting the wrong direction, each syllable falling out like it was forced. “We both already know where I fit into this.”

 

.

 

When Pete wakes up he thinks he’s choking.

It takes almost ten minutes for Andy and Joe to restrain him, and even then he’s still screaming. His lungs feel like they’re on fire, can still feel teeth against his neck, the blood dripping down his chest.

Andy swears and shouts something that sends Joe scrambling around the trunk. Andy’s lips move and Joe returns with a towel that’s pressed to Pete’s chest before he sees what it’s covering.

Patrick’s in the corner the whole time. Body locked, Pete will realize later, face blank and eyes twitching, hands reaching and pulling back with each of Pete’s screams.

Later Andy tells him, voice low and eyes bleeding concern, that he sounded like he was dying.

Andy doesn’t mention the way he was screaming Patrick’s name until his lungs shook. Doesn’t talk about how after the fourth call Patrick ran out like he was being burned and they couldn’t find him for nearly an hour.

Pete doesn’t laugh, doesn’t say, _I don’t think we’re coming back from this._ It’s an even trade of ignorance.

When Andy leaves to relieve Joe and give Pete someone else to watch him, Pete pulls down the towel and looks in the van mirror. There’s a new scar on his chest, puffy and red like it’s not finished bleeding, like it’s not sure how it got there either.

Pete lowers his shirt and lets out a breath. He curls up in the trunk and puts his head in his hands, thinks about how he wants to _wake up._

 

.

 

There are a lot of things Pete hates about the dreams.

How red everything looks. How everything tastes like ash and smells like blood. How there’s always a new cut or bruise left, after. How it’s always Patrick there, smirking, and that Pete wakes up to the ghost he left behind.

Pete can’t decide which is worse: that he keeps having the dreams, or that Patrick looks more alive inside of them.

Joe says they’re like Russian roulette only Pete’s never going to be the winner. It’s the first time any of them have heard Andy laugh in a while so Pete cracks a small smile at it, doesn’t itch at the skin on his back trying to patch itself up.

 

.

 

Pete opens his eyes, torn somewhere between an empty mind space and near nausea, and finds Patrick’s sitting on the trunk door, watching him through the dark.

Pete watches back, stares as Patrick turns back, all rigid edges and sharp with something Pete can’t name.

Patrick shifts, sighs, tired, “Go to sleep, Pete.”

Andy’s snoring in his ear with Joe’s by his feet, arms sprawled over his legs. They’re the only things keeping him in place instead of crawling over trying to get as close as Patrick will let him.

Pete wants to ask him if he gets any of the dreams too. If he has the cuts and scars. Why he doesn’t stay anymore.

Pete takes a breath and stares up at the van ceiling, doesn’t.

 

.

 

Patrick wakes up coughing up something too thick to be blood but still just as red.

Joe wakes Pete up when he elbows his rib reaching for a bucket. Andy throws open the trunk and tries to help guide Patrick out.

Joe’s mumbling, “Holy fucking shit. Holy shit, _Patrick_ ,” when Pete finally sits up enough to see what’s going on.

Andy’s easing him out of the van, covered in the same stuff leaking from Patrick’s mouth and drenching his chin, muttering small encouragements of, “It’s alright, dude. You’re fine, Patrick. It’s alright, just let it all out, dude. That’s good.”

Pete crawls out of the van, slips on the red liquid and covers his hands in it. He doesn’t look at it, just runs right for Patrick until Joe places an arm in front of him. Joe shakes his head, and when they both look back Patrick’s dry-heaving on all fours, Andy patting his back, stare burning through both of them.

Andy leads him back closer to the van, and Pete and Joe start to wipe down the back of the van.

It’s Joe that breaks the silence, voice shaking, striking the room like a bolt of lightning.

“They’re not just dreams are they, Pete?”

Andy doesn’t move from Patrick’s side, just straightens when Joe’s stares, face torn somewhere between despair and resignation. Patrick’s frozen on the ground, won’t look at him.

Pete feels the cuts over his arms and scars shift, looks at the red covering his hands and how he’s shaking with it. He can taste every inch of their fall from grace when he says, “No. They’re not.”

No one flinches when Joe shouts and kicks the van.

 

.

 

It’s cold and silent and Pete doesn’t open his eyes.  
  
Patrick laughs, and Pete can feel it against his ear, in the shiver that runs down his spine.

“Come find me, Pete,” Patrick whispers, cold and cooing, tapping the case on Pete’s wrist, fingers crawling up his arm.

Patrick taps out a rhythm of _ticks_ on his arm. He can feel the cuts open, start to bleed into each other as the scars blister.

Patrick breathes against his ear, smile curling. “I’ll be waiting.”

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Comments and Kudos are very much appreciated! I'm rhymesofblau on tumblr.


End file.
